Installing NewsBlur on Ubuntu Server

NewsBlur is an open-source web-based feed reader that can be installed on Ubuntu Server. In this tutorial, we will go through the steps required to install NewsBlur on Ubuntu Server.

Prerequisites

• A server running Ubuntu 20.04 or later
• A sudo user
• A domain name or subdomain pointing to your server IP address

Step 1: Install Required Dependencies

NewsBlur requires the following dependencies to be installed on the server:

• Git
• Python 3
• PostgreSQL
• RabbitMQ
• Redis
• Node.js

We can install these dependencies using the following commands:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y git python3 python3-pip postgresql postgresql-contrib rabbitmq-server redis-server nodejs

Once the installation is completed, you can check the Python version with the following command:

python3 --version

Step 2: Clone NewsBlur Repository

Next, we need to clone the NewsBlur repository from GitHub. This can be achieved by running the following command:

git clone https://github.com/samuelclay/NewsBlur.git

This will download the repository into the current directory.

Step 3: Create PostgreSQL Database and User

NewsBlur uses a PostgreSQL database to store its data, so we need to create a new database and user for NewsBlur.

Log in to the PostgreSQL shell using the following command:

sudo -u postgres psql

Now we can create a new database and user by running the following commands:

CREATE DATABASE newsblur;
CREATE USER newsblur WITH PASSWORD 'password';
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE newsblur TO newsblur;

Replace the 'password' with a secure password.

Step 4: Install Python Requirements

NewsBlur uses several Python libraries, which can be installed using the requirements.txt file located in the NewsBlur directory.

Navigate to the NewsBlur directory and run the following command:

cd NewsBlur
pip3 install -r requirements.txt

This will install all the required Python libraries for NewsBlur.

Step 5: Configure NewsBlur

Copy the configuration file and update it with PostgreSQL and RabbitMQ credentials:

cp local_settings.py.example local_settings.py
nano local_settings.py

Update the following lines:

DATABASES = {
    'default': {
        'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql_psycopg2',
        'NAME': 'newsblur',
        'USER': 'newsblur',
        'PASSWORD': 'password',
        'HOST': '127.0.0.1',
        'PORT': '5432',
    }
}

CELERY_BROKER_URL = 'amqp://guest:guest@localhost:5672/'

Replace the 'password' in the DATABASES section with the password you used in Step 3.

Step 6: Initialize Database

We need to initialize the database with the following command:

python3 manage.py migrate

Step 7: Start NewsBlur

Start the NewsBlur server with the following command:

python3 manage.py runserver 0.0.0.0:8000

You can now access NewsBlur from your browser using the domain or subdomain name pointing to your server IP address.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we have shown you how to install NewsBlur on Ubuntu Server. You have learned how to clone NewsBlur repository, install the required dependencies, create a PostgreSQL database and user, install Python libraries, configure NewsBlur and start the NewsBlur server.